


Death Among the Living

by 8d6FireDamage



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Mental Health Issues, Original Statement (The Magnus Archives), Statement Fic (The Magnus Archives), Terminal Illnesses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:54:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24655675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/8d6FireDamage/pseuds/8d6FireDamage
Summary: Statement of Nathan Lavelle, regarding their multiple failed attempts at suicide. Original statement given 7th August, 2012. Audio recording by Jonathan Sims, Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute, London.Statement begins.
Kudos: 2





	Death Among the Living

**Author's Note:**

> Alright y'all. Before you head on to the actual fic, I just wanna make sure you're all good. There are explicit and candid descriptions of suicide, death, and depression here. Could definitely be triggering to some people. The narrator does not have a healthy outlook, and I want to make that explicit as well. I'm just working through some feelings, and am perfectly safe and happy. Stay safe and healthy out there, friends!

_ Statement of Nathan Lavelle, regarding their multiple failed attempts at suicide. Original statement given 7th August, 2012. Audio recording by Jonathan Sims, Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute, London. _

_ Statement begins _ .

* * *

It’s my birthday today. Or, well, it used to be. Back before everything that, uh, happened. I can’t remember how old I’m supposed to be anymore. I don’t think I’m supposed to be that old? I remember my childhood,  _ a  _ childhood, I suppose. Whether it’s mine anymore would be the subject of a really interesting philosophical debate about the nature of consciousness and memories, but that’s neither here nor there. I’m sorry. This must be really confusing. Never been good at talking about myself. And fell out of practice in recent years. Let me start over.

I am currently Nathan Lavelle. I am also not Nathan Lavelle. Simultaneously. It’s complicated. I used to be someone else. And before that someone else too. Nathan is the third person I have been. When the time comes you can pass along my condolences. 

I was born Corrine Poole. It’s Corinne’s birthday today. My family, Corinne’s family, liked to tell this little fairytale about the day they were born. The week leading up to their birthday was, apparently, disgustingly hot and muggy. The air was so thick with humidity you felt like you couldn’t breathe. But the actual day itself was uncharacteristically beautiful. Of course, it wouldn’t be me if that stroke of luck wasn’t tinged with a little bit of tragedy. 

I was born sick, the first time. I don’t know the details. Something about insufficient flow of oxygen and severely jaundiced. It was a little touch and go for me, but I managed to pull through. Then I was a child, then I was a teenger, and Corrine made it all the way to the age of sixteen before… Well. Before I killed myself the first time. 

There’s this thing they say about suicide that always made me so anrgy. How it’s always this cry for help. I can say from experience it’s not. And I rather think that at this point I’m an expert on these matters. 

Corinne was just a traumatized child. A child who could not handle the hardships life threw at them, and was just so very tired _.  _ Corinne lay in bed at night so sure that the amount of suffering and pain they felt was too much for any one person to endure, and it was going to kill them in their sleep. Despite being perfectly physically healthy. Corinne was just tired. 

After months and years of thinking about it, Corinne finally made the ultimate decision. So they got a bottle of painkillers, went to the basement of their childhood home in the middle of the night, and ate them one by one until the bottle was empty. 

That was the end of Corinne. But it wasn’t the end of me. No. I didn’t get to rest. My consciousness didn’t fade into that sweet, unfeeling place of oblivion. I didn’t even get to sleep.

Corinne’s mother found their body the next morning, and seeing her reaction I, like a fool, tried to signal that I was fine! False alarm! Maybe I should probably go to hospital or something, but that I was very much alive. I found Corinne’s body, however, was no longer cooperating with my wishes. I could not move. I could not speak. I was locked in. All I could do was watch as Corinne’s mother futilely shook the corpse, and the fear and denial in her eyes. 

Do you know what happens during an embalming? I do. I got to experience my own. I felt my blood slowly being drained and replaced with chemicals. Formaldehyde has a very distinct smell, if you weren’t aware. My mouth was sewn shut, which, fair enough, fat lot of good it’s going to do me. Then they sewed my eyes shut, and my one window into awareness of the world around me was taken away. And that was it. For a long while.

I wasn’t sure how long exactly I was left like that. I knew I was decomposing. Could feel myself rotting away incrementally. It excited me. I thought that must be the solution. Somehow my consciousness was tied to this corpse, and once the corpse was gone I would finally,  _ finally,  _ get to rest. I was wrong.  I woke up. In my bed one morning like it had all been a terrible dream. I stretched. I opened my eyes, and then… I was not Corrine. A flood of memories and experiences and knowledge hit me all at once, and I felt like I was drowning. My name was now Margaret Alquist, a 36 year old engineer and happily married mother of two. Thoughts of Corrine began to fade, and I could almost convince myself that it really was just a bad dream. 

Margaret was a very stressed person. She struggled to balance the life of a mother and her very demanding and often dangerous job helping maintain the nearby nuclear power plant. I mean, she was managing in that sort of baseline way where you could tell it couldn't go on like this forever. She was stretching herself too thin. Then there was the accident. 

Margaret and her family lived quite close to that nuclear power plant. It was an old one. I mean, I'm sure you can look up the news articles about the whole incident, but suffice it to say, there was a leak. I don't know how else to explain it, I've pretty much lost all of Margaret's expertise at this point. Anyway. Water used to cool the reactor core was seeping out and into the ground. It was so slow that no one even noticed until the consequences became too obvious. Well I say no one, it was Margaret's job to notice. And she didn't. 

It started with workers of the plant and their families getting sick in that insidious way radiation works. Cancer. Birth defects. The works. But not enough to raise the alarm. There weren't enough victims for it to be statistically significant. Then the people who lived closest to the plant started getting sick. That silent horror spread out over the town in a wider and wider radius, claiming more and more lives until the powers that be finally took notice. 

Margaret became the scapegoat for the whole affair. Of course, it wasn't just her fault. She was definitely responsible, at least partially, but there were other people who could and should share some of the blame. Sadly it didn't work out that way. 

I guess, really, I'm at fault too? It's so hard to quantify. It's not like the ghost of Corrine inhabited Margaret and Corrine's lack of knowledge caused the whole thing. I  _ was  _ Margaret. I had all her memories, all her expertise, all her hopes and dreams. Margaret existed before me, and then I became Margaret and I acted exactly as Margaret would have done. Corrine didn't have any agency. Corrine is dead. I didn't have any agency either. But I was there. That has to amount to something. 

Margaret did not cope well with the whole causing the deaths of lots of people through your own negligence thing. I don't really know anyone who would, to be fair. Margaret was fired, obviously. She was on the verge of losing her house. There was talk of bringing criminal charges against her. And as if that weren't enough, one of her kids got sick. Very sick. Terminal. If that's not enough to break a person…

The only thing Margaret wanted at this point was a chance to fix this. To repair the reactor and gain some sort of redemption, not be seen as this cartoonish villain receiving their portion of karmic punishment. It should go without saying that wasn't allowed, but that didn't deter Margaret in the least. 

She filled every waking hour she had with finding a solution. Exactly what happened, what mechanical repairs should be made, improving safety procedures, adding fail-safes and monitors, mitigating the loss of life, every single thing that occurred to her she wrote down into a massive report. She mailed that report to everyone she could think of who could help. Published it online for free. 

And then Margaret shot herself. 

So here I am, Nathan Lavelle, making a statement that will never be believed and never help anyone. Nathan's time is coming. It won't be today or tomorrow, but soon. I cannot stop it. I don't know how it will happen. I can just feel it coming. 

I don't know who I will be next, either. I would tell you if I could. This is going to happen again and again, and I will be there every time, drinking in the fear and grief of those I leave behind. 

I don't want this. I never wanted this, but I don't have any agency anymore. I guess I just wanted someone to know the truth of the matter at the very least. I won't let myself hope for answers or a solution. 

I'm just so tired. 

* * *

_ Statement ends.  _

_ There's not much I can follow up on with this statement. I can confirm that Corrine Poole did exist. They were born in 1954 in Inverness, and died at age sixteen in 1970 of an overdose.  _

_ Margaret Alquist also very much existed. There are a number of archived news articles online about her and an accident that occured in 1987 at a nuclear power plant in the US that she is largely blamed for. All other details given about her in this statement can be confirmed.  _

_ As for Nathan Lavelle, there's a note here that he was given several mental health resources and contacts after he gave his statement which he took without argument. We tried to follow up with him, but it seems it is already too late. There's an obituary for him online that details that he died a few months after giving his statement. Suicide. The specifics of it were omitted.  _

_ Unfortunately, there's nothing further we can do with this statement. There's no way to track this person...being, and stop them or help them or otherwise. _

_ Recording ends. _

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr is currycurrie feel free to come yell at me!


End file.
